spirit and healing in africa - University of the Free State

involves people in the spread of justice, mercy and knowledge of God. These three notions are
always interconnected in the action of the Spirit. Welker emphasizes that there is a very direct
link between the founding of mercy, the routinization of mercy, and the cultivation of the public,
universally accessible relation with God (1994:111, italics orginal). In other words, the
relationship with God is built upon the realization of justice and mercy. And when mercy, as the
act of going to meet those who are weaker, the suffering, and the disadvantaged (1994:115), is
absent, then justice is also undermined and an accessible relation to God is obstructed. The triad
of justice, mercy and knowledge of God forms the core of the establishing of righteousness,
which is the fulfillment of God’s law. Put differently, the bearer of the Spirit fulfills God’s law
by establishing justice and mercy, and by glorifying God.
The direct consequence of the work of the Spirit, who rests upon persons and urges them to
spread justice, mercy and knowledge of God, is the community’s obligation to practice mercy
(1994:119). The experiences of the Spirit draw people and societies into responsibility for those
who are weak, afflicted and disadvantaged in a community. Under the influence of the Spirit,
justice, mercy and knowledge of God have become indispensable factors for human life together
(1994:123).
According to Welker (1994:108), the biblical testimonies show that the Spirit has universal
intentions, because they are about preventing disintegration and powerlessness of all people. The
witnesses to the Spirit (particularly the Isaiah texts) portray God’s Spirit as the One who is
related to the bringer of salvation, who establishes justice, mercy and knowledge of God with a
universal extension. Newer testimonies to the Spirit identify the human Jesus of Nazareth as the
chosen Spirit bearer, in whom the presence of God’s Spirit became very concrete (Welker
1994:183-227). This Spirit is the Spirit of Christ, the Spirit who is never self-referential but
always points to Christ and to others. Even the outpouring of the Spirit shares knowledge about
God and about God’s involvement in this reality: “through the pouring out of the Spirit, God
effects a world-encompassing, multilingual, polyindividual testimony of Godself” (Welker
1994:235, italics original; 2006b:230).
The outpouring of the Spirit generates a force field, to which anyone who is touched by the Spirit
belongs (Welker 1994:228-248; 2006b:230). By referring to the Spirit as a force field, as Christ’s
domain of resonance, and as “the pluriform unity of perspectives on Jesus Christ, of relations to
Christ, and of the spoken and lived testimonies to Christ”, Welker addresses the understanding of
the Spirit as a saving public person (Welker 1994:314f). This is how Welker identifies the Spirit
as the One who creates soteriological unity between God and mankind: the Spirit liberates from
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